Why using ATF?
Isn't it better to use a regular diesel additive for cleaning and lubrication?
Someone wrote here that ATF is $3.49, a diesel additive costs only $1.99....
Someone wrote he had to change the o-rings twice, now he is using ATF in his fuel and changing the o-rings is not neccesary...
isnt't it better to get a high quality o-rings. Believe me there are some huge differences in the quality of o-rings...


Jens

 

A friend of mine use ATF in his farm diesel equipment and "No problem". I do not use it and " No Problem" So how could we prove the difference.
I use diesel additive in winter and in summer to lubricate. No blue smoke, no white smoke, no funy smell, no color. I think ATF was used in the pass because there was nothing better."Back in the old days" people use to put 10 W 30 in their 2 cycle engine, it worked ! But you don't see that anymore.

 

We used it in over the road tractors for years to keep the injection system clean.

Jens, how much fuel can you treat for $1.99?

When I was over the road I used to burn 1200 gallons a week, 400 gallons to fill up both tanks one time if it was close to empty.
A quart of ATF cost 1.29 in those days, and a quart of Power Service treated 75 gallons for 3.50. So should I dump a quart of ATF in each tank or two quarts of Power Service? Ahhh 2.58 or 14 dollars....man I gotta think hard on this one.
But then that was before low sulphur fuel was even thought about so it was only to clean the parrafin out of the injection pump and injectors.
It worked well for what we wanted, good running trucks. I will garantee we had good running trucks. If you could have seen the look on that Oregon troopers face that had to chase me 10 miles up a mountain to catch me in his cruiser and he said something like I needed a load in the truck to slow me down some, I jerked the trailer door open and showed him 23 tons of potatos. I almost got out of that ticket, I was only running 87 up the mountain. Sure was glad he did not see me on the flat, but he probably could not have caught me anyway.
When you start burning 2 or 3 hundred gallons of fuel a day you have to find something cheaper than Power Service or FPPF to keep your fuel system clean.
300,000 miles a year / 5 MPG = 60,000 gallons of fuel a year.
800 quarts of Power Service at 3.50= 2,800 dollars a year
300 Quarts of ATF at 1.29 = 387 dollars a year

 

Oh yeah, in the winter I used about 50 gallons of kerosene or 5 gallons of gasoline to 400 gallons of #2 to stop the gelling problems with the ATF to clean the fuel system. Now that was in a cranked up KT600 Cummins puttin about 800 HP to the ground through a 5x4 twin stick trannys.

 

Dave,

what your wrote makes sense to me. There is no question why using AFT instead of any Fuel Additive.
How many AFT do you use for a 19 gal. tank?
I'm think about to swtich from my Additive to AFT.
Fuel Additive is more expensive here in Germany (apporx. $5 for a bottle which treat 10 -15 gal) so is no question why to do that.


Jens

 

Hey Jen

I've been putting 1/2 litre of ATF every second fill-up.
I have not had a problem since.

Oh and by the way....I'm the guy who had to change out the O-rings.The Diesel Additive dried them out to the point of being brittle.
The ATF does not do this...
I'm happy!!

It's way cheaper and it really works well.

 

Well I was using a quart to 200 gallons so if you figure 20 = 1/10 th of a quart. More will not hurt anything. I have 66 gallons on my pickup in both tanks so I just skip a tank or two then drop a 1/3 in the front 20 gallon tank and the rest in the back 46 gallon tank.

With the 7.3 I do not use gasoline in the winter to stop gelling, but I do use a gallon of kerosene in the front tank and two in the back tank down to about 0 F if it is colder than that I double the amount in both tanks. We do not see to may times a year below -15 F. If we did I would probably triple the down to zero amount.

 

Well, I am starting to be convinced. Which type of ATF do you use?

 

DextronIII...it has better Lubricants than the old ATF

 

Some fluid woold damage O rings does'nt it? On some cans of fluid it says not to mix with othe type of fluid it could do damage. I just wonder if any type of ATF is good??

Hummm....

 

I always used type F, back in the OTR trucker days the fuel still had lots of sulpher in it. The only things I needed were the detergents.

Now with fuel checks and low sulpher fuel I use Dextron.

All ATF has conditioners for the rubber seals in an auto tranny.

Where the damage will occur if you put the wrong stuff in your tranny is the clutch pack.